Friends Making Plans
by Nitrowugs
Summary: Buffy and her friends make plans for the future.


**Friends Making Plans**

Author: Nitrowugs

Rating: PG (maybe)

Pairings: Possible B/A, W/O, A/X

Feedback: Yes, please.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything associated with BtVS and AtS. (Characters, plots, and dialogue from the shows are borrowed with no infringement intent whatsoever.)

Distribution: Please ask and let me know where it's going.

Started: 09/10/2009

Completed: 09/11/2009

Summary: Buffy and her friends make plans for the future.

A/N: This story is AU.

Three-year-old Buffy Summers played in her back yard every day with her best friends Willow Rosenberg and Xander Harris under the watchful eyes of at least one of the children's parents. Unlike other three-year-olds who played with their dolls, toy trucks, and such, Buffy and her friends played in the sand box that her father had made for her and they made plans, big plans, for their future.

These plans changed often as new ideas came into their heads, or new story books were read to them by their parents, or new cartoon characters came on their favorite television shows, but they always seemed to return to their original ideas.

Buffy planned to be a super hero and an artist, "Just like Super Girl, Superman's cousin, so I can keep everyone safe from the bad people and mommy can put my pictures on the wall in her gallery."

Willow planned to be a doctor, "So if anybody gets a boo-boo, I can put a bandage on it and give them a lollipop so they won't cry any more."

Xander planned to build big, beautiful houses, "So all of us can have beautiful houses to live in."

As new friends joined the play group each came with his or her own plans for the future. First to join the group was little Cordelia Chase. Her plan was to become a princess.

"You can't be a princess," Willow told her, "Your father has to be a king for you to be a princess."

"Well then I'll marry a king and be a queen. Queen Cordelia."

"Oh, okay."

"And I don't want a house, the queen lives in a castle. Can you build a castle?" Cordelia asked Xander.

"Yes," came the reply, "I can build anything."

Next to join the play group was four-year-old Oz Osbourne. Oz planned to be a musician, "And sing on TV like Elvis."

"Ooo, I'll watch you on TV," said Willow.

"Me, too," the others chimed in.

Last to join the group were Angel O'Brien and Anya Jenkins. They were a couple of years older than the other children, but they were welcomed into the play group. Angel planned to be a super hero as well, "I want to be like the black knight except I will be good and rescue the pretty princess."

Anya wasn't sure what she planned to be, "As long as I have lots and lots of money, more money than anybody else in the world."

It was Angel's idea to prepare and plant a time capsule that contained all of their plans for the future and to open it in twenty years. They all agreed. The little ones were not sure what a time capsule was, but they agreed anyway. All of the parents helped and the time capsule was planted in a corner of Buffy's back yard far enough away from their sandbox so that it would not interfere with their play area. It was to be opened in twenty years on Labor Day.

There it stayed and although it was never forgotten, it was never mentioned again.

Most of the families stayed in Sunnydale. Buffy, Willow, Xander, Cordelia, and Oz went through elementary and high school together. Anya and her family moved away when she was in elementary school and for years the kids lost touch with her. The summer prior to his junior year in high school, Angel left Sunnydale to live with his aunt and uncle in Los Angeles after his parents were killed in an automobile accident.

After high school Buffy and Willow enrolled at the local branch of the University of California, UC Sunnydale. Oz decided to travel with a local band that he joined while still in high school. Xander was hired by a construction company; in the back of his mind was still his plan to build big, beautiful houses. Due to her interest in the theatre, Cordelia left Sunnydale for New York City.

On August 16, 2004, twenty years after the play group planted their time capsule, six members of the group received a formal invitation from Anya informing them that she had reserved rooms for each of them at the newly renovated Sunnydale Inn (which she now owned) for one week starting Sunday before Labor Day. She ended the invitation with, "It's Time".

Everyone showed up on Sunday, early. There were hugs and tears and kisses all around and stories galore as the group got reacquainted.

After comparing their current lives to the twenty-year-old plans that they unearthed in their time capsule, they decided that they were not far off from their original plans.

At this point in their lives they each had achieved varying degrees of success and they were happy with their lives, but no one had found what they considered 'the one'.

Buffy shared ownership of the Sunnydale Art Gallery with her mother. She specialized in ancient weapons, relics, myths and legends and she taught self-defense at Sunnydale High School.

Willow was doing really well in medical school.

Xander owned a construction company that specialized in building huge mansions. While he had completed only three such dwellings, his company was sought after by some of the wealthiest families in California.

Cordelia had received rave reviews for her latest off-Broadway performance and she was currently looking forward to her first Broadway play.

Oz had left his original high school group and formed his own band. Their first album featuring a new twist on music from old horror movies was doing very well moving up the charts.

Angel and two friends he met in high school ran a successful investigations firm in Los Angeles.

Anya had received a huge settlement from an automobile accident. Unfortunately her favorite antique car that had been left to her by her father was totaled in the accident.

As they approached the end of their week together Angel had an idea. "Why don't we do another time capsule, this time with maybe a ten-year limit and see where we all are ten years from now?'

Buffy liked the idea of getting together again, but had reservations about the time frame. "I'd hate for us to lose track of each other for another ten years. Why don't we agree to keep in touch via e-mail if nothing else? We can send out bulletin-like e-mails whenever something really significant happens in our lives and still plan to get together again in five or ten years."

Willow was immediately on board. "I like that idea. We could set up e-mail addresses specifically for our communications with each other. That way we don't have to worry about sifting through the hundreds of e-mails that we get and missing one of ours."

Cordelia was thinking ahead. "Since some, if not all, of us will probably be married with families by then, why don't we reserve suites here, now, for each of us? We can then bring whomever we want. We can do that can't we Anya?"

"Sure we can. How about floors four and five? They're the nicest right now."

They continued modifying their new set of plans until everyone agreed, just as they had twenty years before.

When they parted at the end of the week, several unexpected events occurred.

Angel hesitated before leaving; he really didn't want to say goodbye to his old friends – one beautiful, blond, green-eyed friend in particular. Without warning he turned to Buffy and said, "This week has been wonderful and I don't want to say goodbye to you for another five years, or another five hours for that matter."

"Oh, Angel, I..."

Buffy's words were cut off when Angel's lips met her in a sweet kiss.

That seemed to be the impetus everyone was waiting for. Oz gave Willow a kiss on the cheek and asked if he could stop by to see her when he was in Boston next month. Willow was over-joyed.

Xander gave Anya a wink as he started to leave, but Anya wasn't having it; she grabbed him and gave him a big kiss. "I'm so glad you did that," Xander told her and as he returned the kiss, Anya thought to herself -

"If the sparks that I saw among all of us this past week are any indication, e-mails will soon be flying like crazy and I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to reserve at least a couple of honeymoon suites."

The end


End file.
